Giving up

Okay, I think I'm giving up on the idea of fully recapping my Pacific Northwest trip. Instead, you can enjoy the pictures on my photoblog, and I will just list my favorites of the trip here:

1. Powell's City of Books, Portland: I'm a big book nerd, and this place is tons of fun for readers like me. There's not only aisle after aisle and room after room of books, but the books are both new and used so you can bargain hunt, and I do love bargains! Haley's mom gave us a $50 gift certificate, so we were able to get a couple of books each, which was wonderful.

2. Costello's Travel Caffe, Portland: I really wish I could transport this travel-themed cafe down to Southern California, because it is the next best thing to ACTUALLY traveling, and I would spend so much time there. Two walls of the cafe have flat screen TVs on them, showing a different destination each day (we went there twice, and they had scenes from London one day and from Prague the other.) They also have nightly events, including things like showing a foreign film, live international music, or spanish conversation night. The food and dessert was great, and so was the atmosphere--it made me feel like I really could have been in the midst of traveling in some foreign country--I just loved it there.

3. Oregon Zoo tour, Portland: I haven't been to a zoo in about ten years, and I'm so used to looking at marine life that it was a nice change to see some terrestrial animals. And boy did we get to see them--up close and personal. An aquarium friend was able to get into contact with someone at the zoo for me, so we were given a behind-the-scenes tour by one of the keepers. It was AMAZING being able to get so close to the sun bears, polar bears, tigers, leopard, otter, and steller sea lions. AMAZING.

4. Oregon Coast drive: Mesha drove me up and down the coast, and it was beautiful! I'm so used to the over-developed coastline here, and it was refreshing to see the stretches of untouched coastline there. I was *crossing my fingers* and hoping to see whales--or even A whale--during my trip to the coast. We did see the spout of one from a lookout, but couldn't find it again when we drove down to get a closer look. And we missed one spyhopping near the tidepools by a couple of hours. So, I had no luck in seeing whales =(

5. Eating good seafood, especially Tidal Raves in Depoe Bay, OR: I wanted seafood, and I got seafood. Clam chowder, steamed clams, fresh fish, crab cakes, crab cocktail, fish and chips, seafood pasta...mmm...

6. Pike Place Market

7. Seattle public library: again, it's cause I'm a book nerd, and the architecture and design of the 10-story building was just so cool.